On Thu, Sep 09, 2004 at 03:34:31PM -0600, Larry Hunter wrote: > Argh!!!! I'm trapped in XServer hell, and I need a workaround! > > I'm running Debian testing on an IBM thinkpad (X21) whose graphics > card is an "ATI Rage Mobillity P/M AGP 2x (rev 64)" aka MACH64. > > I foolishly upgraded to XFree86 4.3 as part of a general update. It > turns out (after much gnashing of teeth) that in release 4.3 XFree86 > disabled display switching via the BIOS (that is, by Fn-F7 or > similar). [...] > Workarounds are tough: For now, the best I can come up with is to > restart the X server with ctl-alt-backspace and hit FN-F7 twice before > the server starts. Not real reliable. I tried atitvout (a nice > package written by , the same person who posted that > useful diagnosis above). Although it detects the LCD and the CRT > (well, projector) fine, it complains that "VBE call failed" when I try > to use it to select the CRT. get-edid also complains that "VBE call > failed" so perhaps it is some ATI strangeness. > > I suppose it would be possible to downgrade to an earlier XFree86, but > when I tried to do that, I get dpkg errors in preconfigure and > configure saying "discover: Bus not found". That way seems to lie > madness. > > Is there anything anyone can suggest to address this while I wait for > Debian to move to X.org or whatever is going to happen? I apologize for taking so long to get back to you. Downgrading may work after all -- try removing the discover package altogether. It's not essential for system operation. What you're seeing is the consequences of losing some more robust error-handling in the xserver-xfree86 config script when you downgrade. Also, just FYI, X.Org was forked from XFree86 right before XFree86 4.4.0 RC3 (release candidate 3) was released, not 4.2.99 as you said. -- G. Branden Robinson | If atheism is a religion, then Debian GNU/Linux | health is a disease. branden@debian.org | -- Clark Adams http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |
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